


Times change

by willowmellontree



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Audio 043: Rhys & Ianto's Excellent Barbecue, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Ianto knows everything, M/M, reference
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:06:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28367373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/willowmellontree/pseuds/willowmellontree
Summary: Jack realises that he doesn't have to hide anymore. Not from Ianto anyway
Relationships: Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones
Comments: 1
Kudos: 38





	Times change

Ianto came into Jack's office with a couple of mugs of his coffee. He only had to make four lots today because Gwen was on maternity leave with her second child.

Tosh and Owen were downstairs, working on a joint project, and there wasn't anything else to do today unless there was a rift alert, so Ianto thought now would be a good time to spend an hour or two with Jack. 

Jack was looking through his photos with a sad smile on his face. There were a lot of stories that came with those photos, and Jack told each one in precise detail. That way, it would be harder for him to forget all those people. Ianto passed his lover his mug before he sat next to him so he could look at the photos as well. It was of a woman he had never seen before. "Who's that?" He asked.

"My mother," Jack answered. "I finally figured out how to transfer images from the vortex manipulator onto paper. Took long enough."

Ianto carefully took the picture from Jack's hands. He could tell they were related. They both had the same shaped eyes and the same charming grin. "Well, I know where you get your looks from."

Jack smiled. "I always thought I looked more like my father." He took another photo from his tin and handed it to the other man. The photo showed a man and two smaller boys with the sea as a background.

"I think you looked like him when you were younger," Ianto observed. He put the photos on the desk and sipped some coffee from his mug. "Tell me a story?" He asked.

Jack slid his arm around Ianto’s waist and lent back into his chair. "When I was eleven, I found a book. It was a story about a person from the twenty-third century who struggled with their identity. Each chapter was a year of their life, and they decided that they didn't want to be a woman or a man. People were more accepting at that time, so they told everyone and society took it in its stride. After reading it, I realised I didn't like labels and if anyone had to call me anything, then it would be with they/them pronouns. Obviously, travelling in the distant past was a bit of a problem because few people would understand it. Being stranded in the 19th century meant that not many people understood it, if any at all, so I just made it easier for everyone just to be he/him. If I remember rightly, this is the time where people are more aware of it."

Ianto snuggled in closer to his lover. "Did you want me to refer to you as they/them?"

Jack nodded. "Yes, please." They said. "You don't mind, do you?"

"Course I don't," Ianto told them. "You're still you and I'll always love you no matter who you want to be." 

Jack sighed contently. "That means a lot."

............................

A few weeks later, Gwen came back from maternity leave because she couldn't stand to sit on the sofa all day anymore. Jack made her do desk work if she wanted to be here because doing fieldwork while nearly eight months pregnant is obviously dangerous. Tosh and Owen now knew to refer to Jack as they/them, but Gwen didn't yet. 

"I was thinking Dafydd after Rhys’s friend Daf. You remember he died a few years ago. If we have another girl, then it would be Erin. Rhys likes that name." Gwen told them all when no one could be bothered to do any work.

Tosh was sitting at her desk. "They sound lovely, Gwen."

"Are you sure you don't want to find out the gender?" Owen asked.

Gwen grinned. "There's no fun in that."

Jack came up behind Ianto and wrapped their arms around him. "I knew this girl once called Erin. I was in India at the time and she was working for Torchwood New Delhi."

Gwen sat up in surprise. "There's a Torchwood in India?"

Ianto rolled his eyes. "There was. And there are at least three Torchwoods in every continent, but they made us headquarters after the Battle of Canary wharf. I know there's one in the Philippines, Tokyo, and Sydney. One in Cairo and two in the Amazon. Toronto is only a warehouse with archives and there's one in South Africa and a new one in Los Angeles after Miracle day."

Jack laughed. "It's amazing how much you know." They kissed Ianto on the cheek.

The archivist continued. "There's another twenty around the world that are either missing or that we don't know the location for and everywhere that they don't have a Torchwood, they have a UNIT base."

"So do they all look after rifts?" Gwen asked. She really never reads anything, does she?

"No," Ianto told her. "Some of them specialise in alien tech and others are research stations. Some have to monitor suspicious looking things that fell out of the sky. Torchwood Namibia monitors a massive purple egg and has done for fifty years because no one can see what's inside. I think we have a base in Antarctica which looks for alien objects in the ice. After we had that trip in the Marina Trench, Jack employed a few people to monitor it. After all, we can't always keep going all over the world to do something."

Gwen blew out her cheeks. "How many people actually work for Torchwood currently?"

Ianto winced as he tried to remember the exact number. "Last time I checked, it was 41 active field agents including us. 12 archivists, 19 specially trained medics, 4 tech experts, 13 scientists, 16 group leader and a Jack. Along with 39 season personnel who switch between Torchwood and other organisations, 7 language experts and a Pterodactyl. Since 1879, there have been 2174 Torchwood members to date who have dealt with over a thousand alien encounters." He looked at everyone's faces. "And before you ask, I know everything."

Everyone agreed that Ianto was brilliant.

**Author's Note:**

> I strayed a bit from the main focus but hope you like it.


End file.
